Chapter Two
Kurenai met with her new students in an empty training field the next afternoon.
They had just come from school, where they hung out more with each other. Naruto kept giving Hinata funny, confused looks, Sakura had looked curious about the change in Ino, and all the more rough and tumble guys in the class were obviously wondering why the hell Tenten was hanging around with women, especially a girl like Yamanaka. Ino's former friends started spreading rumors, which hurt her more than she liked to admit. Vindictive till the end, she spread the return rumor that the girls were jealous because she was still beating them in class, which might not be purely a rumor, come to think of it.
But now they were here, and training with Kurenai was what was important.
"I am going to teach all three of you the art of genjutsu," she said. "However, I also want you to improve your clan skills during this time as well. Tenten, as you have no clan scrolls, what would you like to specialize in? I can get scrolls for that area of specialization from within the ninja archives."
"Well… I've always been fascinated by weapons," Tenten admitted.
"A weapons specialist, then?" Tenten nodded eagerly. "I can do that. I would recommend specializing in the sword, the tanto knife, the pole, the chain, senbon needles, kunai and shuriken, ninja wire, and explosive tags. You should also keep a physical dome shield handy inside a sealing scroll, to block off attacks. Most weapons specialists hide all their weapons inside the seals within storage scrolls, then keep the storage scrolls on their person, so I'll buy you several of those as well. Once using storage scrolls, you can unseal all weapons at once in a ninjutsu-style barrage attack.
"Ino, Hinata, in the interests of being upfront, would you like to explain what your clans do?"
"Well, you already know a lot about mine," said Hinata. "We use our Byakugan eyes in our Jyuuken taijutsu." She made a hand seal and her eyes gained intense-looking pupils, the veins around her eyeballs bulging with chakra. "Byakugan eyes can see through anything and for long distances. We look into a person's chakra coils, and shut down their tenketsu, causing massive internal organ damage with small chakra taps.
"However, the Hyuuga have another ability: we can emanate chakra from all of our own tenketsu at once. This can be used to free us from prisons, cut through techniques, or shield us from blows. It helps us fend off long distance attacks."
"And my clan, the Yamanaka, specialize in mind techniques," said Ino, shrugging. "Our biggest techniques involve either entering a person's mind, leaving our own body vulnerable but taking over that person's body as a hostage and reading their mind, or actually controlling a person's body from within our own body but not being able to enter or read their mind. When we enter a mind, our body gains all the injuries their body does. With body control, that's not the case, making it more useful for battle-type situations.
"The really good Yamanaka can catch a person from every angle, or control multiple people at once. Theoretically, I could use multiple person body control to force an entire squadron of enemies to kill each other.
"So we're going to learn all those things… then genjutsu on top of that?" Ino grinned. "Badass."
"Yes. As you can see from all of your individual abilities, your personal techniques have weaknesses as long as the person can see where you are. Ino has a certain range after which her control techniques can no longer reach someone. Tenten and Hinata are mainly close distance fighters. If someone can see you, they can thwart you by jumping out of range or keeping a safe distance away from you using techniques.
"But if the person can't see where you are… such as when you put them under a multiple layer genjutsu, so that they break out of one illusion only to fall into another… then it's a whole different story. Even the fighter with the tightest defenses leaves themselves vulnerable from another angle if they direct all their fighting power toward the person they think is across from them. And multiple layer genjutsu, if not explained, can also really psyche a ninja out - there's nothing like making a ninja doubt what is real to freak them out. I, for example, am a genjutsu specialist, but I've also mastered taijutsu. I put a mirage in front of someone and then cripple them with a physical attack from elsewhere."
Kurenai smiled. The girls were grinning, excited, and their enthusiasm was nice to see.
"So get your clan scrolls from your clans. Tenten, I will bring your scrolls to our next meeting, from the archives. I will also help you buy the weapons you need."
"Thank you, Kurenai-sensei," said Tenten, bowing low in genuine gratefulness. It was something she'd been worrying about.
"Now. On to what we have on the agenda for today." Kurenai went over to the nearest tree. "Tree climbing."
"... Climbing a tree is going to help us become better ninja?" asked Ino, nonplussed, and the other two girls also looked confused.
Kurenai's lips twitched toward an amused smile. "You're sort of right," she said. "The real point of the thing is how you climb the tree. That is, without using hands. Let me demonstrate." She made a hand seal and channeled chakra, and the soles of her feet glowed blue. She began walking sideways straight up the tree, no hands. The girls gasped.
"This is exercise one," she said. "Channel chakra into the soles of your feet, supposedly the hardest place to channel chakra, and use that chakra to walk straight up virtually any sideways or upside down surface. Now. Exercise two."
She walked back down the tree and walked over to the nearby creek, her feet still glowing blue. She began walking straight over the top of the water.
"Water walking," she said. "Using chakra to keep yourself steady on unsteady surfaces. Exercise three, at last, does not involve your feet."
The glowing in her feet faded. She walked over, picked up a leaf, and her hand glowed blue. The leaf curled in the flat palm of her hand without Kurenai ever touching it.
"Leaf bending," she said. "Moving something small with chakra without ever touching it once.
"These exercises - tree climbing, water walking, and leaf bending - will be useful to you for several reasons. First, once you do them, you will be able to channel chakra into your legs and arms to make yourselves stronger and faster during fights. That's the more obvious application.
"However, it's also important for genjutsu. Illusions require high levels of chakra control and enormous intelligence. This is because genjutsu involves feeding a highly controlled trickle of chakra into the victim's cerebral nervous system, and then setting a detailed and imaginative false sensory experience there without them noticing. It can be done even from great distances for those experienced and talented in the art.
"And while your grades in chakra control and intelligence cannot compare to Haruno Sakura's -" Here, the girls rolled their eyes and made a face. "Your chakra control and intelligence skills are still, to all reports, very great. And unlike Haruno Sakura, you have the correct ninja mentality.
"So I expect that you will master these chakra control exercises very quickly. However, you also need to work on building up chakra endurance - maintaining genjutsu, especially multi layered genjutsu, requires more chakra than you yourselves have right now. So while your chakra control is great, your chakra amount is low."
"How do we fix that?" asked Tenten, frowning.
"The answer is simple. You do these exercises - over, and over, and over again. We will do this for a solid week. Only then will we move on to actual genjutsu related exercises.
"In the meantime, familiarize yourselves with your other specialized ability scrolls. My idea is that you will learn both genjutsu and your own specialized skill at the same time.
"So. Let's begin."
The girls started with tree climbing. They took a kunai, ran up the side of the tree using chakra, and marked their highest point with the kunai. Then they fell back down, and tried again, attempting to beat their best level of height.
As Kurenai had said, they moved quickly from getting all the way to the top of the tree, to getting their feet and ankles wet trying to walk atop the water of the creek. Once they had mastered water walking, they sat there and concentrated on leaves, feeling rather stupid, until, with sudden explosive cheers from them, their leaf managed to move of its own accord.
This whole process didn't take very long. But as Kurenai had demanded, they then continued to go through the exercises over - and over - and over again. It was almost mind numbing. They also sparred with each other, getting accustomed to the feeling of making themselves faster and stronger using chakra in fights.
It finally happened.
They got dirty and worked up a sweat, and though Ino and Tenten felt like complaining, Hinata's calm acceptance of the hard work motivated them not to make a sound. And though Hinata felt like giving up at times when she did badly, she saw that Ino and Tenten never gave up and she didn't want to let them down. So they were good for each other.
But finally Ino, who was still dieting, passed out.
She began to fall at a great distance, from the tree. The other three panicked; in a second, Kurenai was underneath Ino at the base of the tree; meanwhile, Tenten and Hinata had sprinted down their respective trees and caught Ino by the legs. They let her gently down into Kurenai's waiting arms.
Ino felt cold water splash on her face from a water bottle and she blinked awake. Her vision was blurry, her head was pounding, and she felt nauseous. "Ugh…" she groaned.
"Ino. You didn't eat this morning, did you?" asked Kurenai. She was outwardly calm, but her eyes flashed and there was anger in her voice.
Ino winced. "... No," she admitted.
Tenten sighed and shook her head. Kurenai said with a voice of icy steel, "What you do on your own time is your business, but I will from now on bring you a big meal during every training session and you will eat it half an hour before we start training. My time, my rules."
Ino sat up.
"You have to eat something," said Hinata in concern, offering the packed lunch she'd brought with her.
"I'm not hungry," Ino muttered.
"That's because you're sick," said Kurenai, her voice still tight with anger (which was how she expressed her worry). "This is the time when you need to eat the most. Force some food down and you'll feel better."
So Ino started eating. She refused to admit it… but it did make her feel better.
"You shouldn't be dieting at all," Tenten scolded, irritated. "It's not like you need it."
Ino was silent, torn. Didn't she need to get skinnier to have the perfect body?
She was still thinking about this when she went home for the day. When she entered the house, her father said with approval, "You have been training all this time, Ino?"
"That's what it looks like," said Ino sourly.
Her father, a quiet man who worked Intel for ANBU, offered her a genuine smile. "Very good."
Ordinarily, Ino would have bragged and preened herself upon any hint of approval toward her training methods, but right now she was too distracted.
"Ino," her mother, a dignified older woman, asked frowning from the kitchen. "What's wrong?"
"Dad," said Ino, troubled, "can I have the Yamanaka clan scrolls? I want to practice their techniques with this new tutor I have. She's going to teach me how to combine genjutsu with the Yamanaka control techniques."
Her father's eyebrows rose in surprise. "Certainly," he said after a moment, exchanging puzzled looks with Ino's mother. "I'm glad you're taking an interest. It sounds fascinating. If you have any questions, I'll be glad to answer them."
Ino wandered up the stairs and stared at her body in her floor length bedroom mirror. She'd die before she admitted it to anyone else, but all she saw were her body's flaws: the obvious curves, the little rolls of fat here and there. Pathetic for both a ninja and a woman, she thought. What must other people think? Popular girls were supposed to be skinnier; Ino still hadn't entirely given up on this dream and idea.
But Tenten had said she didn't need to be on a diet. Had she been lying? What on earth could Tenten mean?
Tenten entered the long, rambling building in the evening. It might have been a clan compound, except it was rundown, surrounded by weeds and hundreds of dirty, shouting children without surnames.
The orphanage.
Tenten entered and the matron immediately shouted and bemoaned at the state of her. "Tenten! Again? What on earth have you been doing?!" She said this every time.
"Training," said Tenten tightly.
The matron scowled and glared at her, hands on her hips, her age showing on the ever-deepening wrinkles in her sour face. "Still haven't given up on your pipe dream of becoming a ninja, then?"
"No," said Tenten flatly, glaring, eyes fiery.
"Well, you will soon enough," the matron dismissed. "Shoo! Go! To your room! Clean up!" All her orders came in a bark, in a snap. She waved Tenten away.
Tenten walked down the long, bare, clinical corridors to her tiny single room. There, she collapsed down on her bed and glared up at the cracks in the ceiling as if they were at fault.
"Someday," she muttered quietly, "I'm going to get out of here. I'm going to have a ninja clan name and my own home. And I'm going to be one of the most amazing kunoichi that's ever lived."
This was her mantra. She repeated it to herself every night. Only now, when Kurenai had promised her genjutsu lessons and training scrolls and a whole host of brand new weapons and storage seals, did it seem genuinely within her grasp.
She promised herself that she would do whatever Kurenai asked of her, as long as it would get her out of this place. As long as it would make her a worthwhile ninja.
Hinata entered the quiet, magnificent Hyuuga clan compound late in the evening. Again. She looked up, and swallowed. Her father, tall, cold, chilly, and dignified, was waiting for her.
"You are late again," he said in a soft voice, but behind it lurked danger.
"I-I was training," Hinata offered timidly. She'd always felt more natural around her mother, but her mother had died years ago.
"Well, then let's see the results of this magnificent training. We are having the clan spars. Come with me." He turned around, and she followed him silently down hallways to the clan sparring room, a large space covered with mats.
This was a Hyuuga clan ritual. Once a week, the entire clan got together and watched the clan children fight one another, hoping that they would slowly improve in the Hyuuga arts. Hanabi was standing on the mat, and Hinata's heart nearly stopped.
"You have never been able to defeat your younger sister," said their father in a voice of enormous sarcasm. "Perhaps all your magnificent training will enable you to." There were low chuckles from the clan elders sitting off to the side. Everyone was watching.
"Y-yes, Father," was all Hinata could say helplessly. She faced her sister on the mat. Neji, their cousin, older but closest to them in age, looked contemptuous and skeptical from his viewing place.
Hanabi looked like their mother, slim and beautiful with long dark hair. Hinata cared for her dearly, in spite of their disagreements, which was why she had never been able to hit Hanabi. But she remembered her team's words: That working hard and never giving up without complaining was best, that girls were supposed to help each other, that one should always spar a friend with an eye for keeping them from dying out on the field.
Hanabi's face was twisted in a snarl as she got into her stance, but she was also not watching Hinata's movements - she was leaving herself wide open.
Hinata's determination formed. She was going to try to help Hanabi become a better Jyuuken user by showing her what she was doing wrong. This shouldn't be impossible - in theory, she noted with nerves.
Their father shouted, "Begin!" and Hanabi lashed out fast - but with chakra channeled in her limbs, Hinata was faster. She caught Hanabi's block, and as Hanabi paused in surprise, Hinata attacked her vulnerable bottom half. Hanabi's legs went out from under with a yelp, and Hinata paused with a hand over Hanabi's heart.
They did not use actual chakra in the clan spars, but faux tenketsu hits were acknowledged.
"Killing blow," she said, her voice trembling. "I win this round. You were so busy snarling at me, you left yourself vulnerable. And you are not as fast as you think you are."
Hinata stepped back, as Hanabi lay there shaking with silent rage. Their father looked thoughtful, impressed - by Hinata, not Hanabi. The rest of the clan had gone silent in surprise.
"I have been training," Hinata repeated quietly, bowing her head once.
Hanabi shot to her feet. "I should have won! It should have been me!" she fumed, shrieking.
"Hanabi!" their father thundered from his straight-backed place at the front of the room. "Silence yourself!"
"NO! Hinata is weak, she could not have beaten me!" And Hanabi stormed off the mat and out of the room.
"Hanabi!" Hinata called after her, distraught, but Hanabi did not come back. Hinata feared she had just made an enemy of her sister, and this caused her more sorrow than fear.
"At least Hinata never made a fuss like that," she heard one clan elder mutter to the other. The tone of the room had started to change.
"Hinata. You seem to have improved," said Hiashi, and Hinata began to smile. Then: "Face Neji."
Hinata went silent with fearful horror. Neji was a genius, the best of the clan. She'd never lasted more than approximately fifteen seconds against him. He was infamous for learning high level techniques no one had ever formally taught him, and for being an expert at reading people and fighters.
He was confident, not arrogant - there was a difference.
Neji walked over to face her on the mat. "You cannot win, Hinata-sama," he intoned solemnly. "You may think you have changed, but you haven't. People don't change. And I will prove it to you." He got into a stance.
Hinata felt her courage waver. How could she possibly defeat Neji? But then she thought of Ino and Tenten - working themselves to the point of absolute exhaustion. Would they have given up in this situation? No! And they saw her as worthy, so neither would she!
Recharged, she got into a Jyuuken stance. She saw momentary surprise flit over Neji's features at the change in her expression.
Hinata went in first, and she was firm, aggressive, but not stupid. Neji backed up and backed up, she thought she was winning - then suddenly, when she was deep inside his territory, he lashed through all her defenses and knocked her down with a single blow.
"I win," he said quietly. "Do you see? No change." And he walked away. Hinata lay there on the mat in his wake, defeated. She stayed like that until the clan had filtered out and her father walked up to her. Slowly, with effort, she sat up.
"You have improved," said her father, but she could see the disappointment in his face and hear it in his voice. It was horrible. "You lasted longer than you ever have against him. How have you improved so quickly?"
Hinata looked up, and stood. "I'm doing private tutoring with Yuuhi Kurenai and two other girls - one of them a Yamanaka. She is going to teach me how to combine Hyuuga techniques with genjutsu. And I know the Byakugan can see through genjutsu!" she added quickly, when her father's eyes widened in alarm. "But most others' eyes cannot, and Yuuhi-san, who is solely responsible for my improvement, has pointed out that with genjutsu the victim could not see the Hyuuga attacking, making our techniques even deadlier. I - I thought this was a good argument." She bowed her head, wincing and waiting.
"... Very well," said her father, surprising her. "We will see how you do. Clearly, Hanabi is no longer a challenge for you, but Neji seems to be. I will watch this carefully."
Hinata suddenly looked up, an idea popping into her head. A challenge for her. "Father, may I leave?" she said suddenly, excited. "I must ask Neji-nii-san something!"
"Go ahead," said her father, and he looked after her in bemusement as she hurried away. It was the most spirited he had seen her in a long time.
"Neji-nii-san!" she called, seeing him as he traveled back to his quarters. He was alone. She hurried up to him and said breathlessly, "Please continue to spar with me!"
Neji raised an eyebrow. "You wish to be defeated again?"
"I am training. Taking scrolls from the Hyuuga main library, starting basic and then getting bigger. I wish for you to spar with me regularly so I can improve my Hyuuga clan arts. There are several things in it for you. First, you will learn legally and by proxy any high level art I take from the main library." Here, Neji's eyes sharpened. "Second, you will be doing your duty, which will look good and win you favor with my father. Third, if I do not improve, you will get to say I told you so. But if I do improve… you will be forced to rethink your 'everyone is fated, no one ever changes' philosophy in several ways."
It was a bold challenge, unusual coming from Hinata. Perhaps that was why Neji said curiously at last, "Alright. I accept." He lifted his chin and added frostily, "Prepare yourself. I will show you no mercy."
"I know," said Hinata, nodding her head. "That is why I asked you. Thank you." And she walked away to go visit the Hyuuga main library and take out the correct scrolls. This was her, mastering the Hyuuga arts from the ground up.
So she had gained allies in Neji and her father, but lost one in her sister - the clan heiress.
Author's Notes: Academy relationships weren't heavily featured in this chapter, but I will be featuring them more in the following chapters. I just had to set some things up. From now on, I'm planning on each chapter being cut into three sections - "Academy Relationships," "Training," and "At Home/Personal Struggles."